your problem may be two things: first, if both $cals_info{$cals_type}{low_count_no} and $cals_info{$cals_type}{high_count_no} are supposed to be from the columns of just numbers, then one of the two is being misassigned to the last column. second, if one of the two is *supposed* to be the last column, then you're using the incorrect operator. "eq" is the string comparison op. "==" is the numerical comparison op.