Working to rules

I was feeling very positive earlier this week. No, I hadn't been offered a full time job, nothing that exciting but as one three month contract came to a close at the end of July several more appeared on the horizon. I have a further 20 days on one project starting now, some confirmed work in early September that will also pay quite well and it looks as if a new contact can also give me 12 to 20 days work from mid August. There's also a possibility of a further 3 months work from mid September. No full time job anywhere in sight but there is some income still coming in. Money is tight but we are still surviving. Networking is working it seems.

Great news. Or is it?

The thing is mortgage protection insurance (MPI). I've been paying for this for years and have finally got to the point where I could claim it. Of course it is worth quite a lot of money and will cover the mortgage payments for 12 months. You have to be registered as unemployed to claim it though. And this is where it gets complicated. Stay with me as I am still trying to get my head around it.

• You can defer your MPI claim for up to six months after becoming unemployed if you have, as I have, part time work that takes up more than 15 hours per week.
• You can sign on as unemployed and take on part time work as long as, yes you are ahead of me, do not work more than 15 hours per week.
• You have to register as unemployed to claim MPI.
• After 6 months the MPI provider assumes that if you still have part time work then you must be fully employed and therefore you cannot make a claim for insurance cover for a further 12 months from that date. Their rules not mine.
  

So here I am. At the end of September I will have deferred my claim for 6 months. I have work, it seems, that will take me into October and perhaps further. However this is only part time work and the income barely covers outgoings. We'll ignore taxes, pension payments, shoes for the children and so on for the moment otherwise my head will implode. So it looks as if I will have to turn down some part time work to claim the MPI from October onwards even though the amount that will be paid will be less than I could have earned working part time. And the MPI company will not change its rules. Because I've asked. And they said NO.

Bummer.

This is a dilemma as there may be a full time job with either organisation eventually. Eventually.
And I don't want to go self-employed again because I cannot be sure that the work will last much beyond October and then I really will be stuck if it doesn't.

Right now I really don't know what to do.
I'll have to think carefully about this or, of course, I could ignore it and see if all goes away but that probably is not a likely option. I dunno, doesn't life get complicated sometimes?