Thanks for the help guys

& yes, i would ditch the "guess" strips, but Ben doesn't sell to Canada...lol

Actually there were two different reagent type kits in the "pool house" of this place that we bought this last winter; unfortunately, I'm apparently too "stupid" to figure out how to use them.
The directions didn't make any sense to me. Even watching the Pool store people do these types of tests still had me confused about what i was really looking for in each test... ( I mean yeah if it's just colour changing, I can do that... but if it's watching how the "dots" spread out or not & how many drops needed before..? whatever?..... I don't get it...lol)

So I have actually 5 different types of strips... we have two hot tubs as well, so I have to keep on it.
And I also have an electronic CL & PH meter. I know those aren't supposed to be that acurate either, but i do comparrisons with all the strips & so far everything seems to be matching up.
I also do weekly water tests through our Hot Tub store ( rather, the store that we use; it's not "my" store, although I'd love to work there)... they're computerized for testing.
I also am doing monthly water tests at another pool store, just to compare test between the two stores.

My conclusion is that nothing is 100% acurate, but I can get a pretty good picture between all of these different tests