@Lauren employed sometimes have to claim MA too unfortunately. That’s my position and it sucks. But I am to set up my own business in the next year, and hope to have a second child, so will end up going through it again anyway. I do believe you can still work KIT days as self employed though, as this is often essential to do for self employed people, otherwise their business will close entirely which isn’t always feasible (I.e. admin, accounting days etc) 😊
I’m a self employed beauty therapist so a little bit different but yes your not allowed to be earning any income whilst on maternity leave. Maternity allowance is only £688 a month which isn’t great when employed get so many weeks/months at full pay 😭
If you work completely online, you can have a friend or family member pack and send orders for you so you're not working. And then you still have 10 KIT days to work when it's something only you can do