> I wouldn't be surprised if the business had been able to pay money to Google to be able to check reviews before they went live and mark them as spam.

I would be really surprised, as such a scheme existing without being exposed by now seems highly unlikely, and it would completely undermine the value of Google Maps reviews once everyone knows businesses can freely curate their reviews. Why would you bother looking up reviews for a business if you already knew any legitimate negative ones would be censored out? You wouldn't. Nobody would. Reviews on Google Maps would be discontinued by now if it were ever the case.