The question of tax evasion, especially regarding the ITBIS, or value added tax, has reached such proportions that the head of the Department of Taxes (DGII) said he has a list of 800 businesses that will be asked to visit his department. What is happening, according to Juan Hernandez, director of the DGII is that the merchants are charging the VAT tax but not sending the funds to the government. The law provides for jail sentences from two months to two years for offenders. Hernandez said that there were 14,754 businesses that had not sent in the salary deductions that they had taken from their employees and that there were more than 4,000 that had not paid the VAT taken from consumers. According to Hernandez, the businesses will be subject to the strict observance of the Tax Code, since the government is losing RD$5.0 billion in uncollected taxes.