UIF cruel treatment

I contacted the call centre today and was told I will not be paid for the period of unemployment March 2021 to 11 July 2021 because I am employed, please clarify this statement, life did not stop when I was unemployed and the UIF processes did not do the payments until November 2021, so UIF delayed the payment process on purpose to safe money? I do not understand how you can be so cruel as to delay payment and let me suffer a whole year of trying to survive with debt accumulated while I was unemployed and receiving zero payment.....