Tagged schemes at CAE & L3 are expensive, but they come with job offers. You’re still paying for your initial licence, and perhaps a type rating. But, you have a guaranteed job afterwards. Definitely not P2F.
Even paying for a type rating comes with a job offer. You’re not paying to fly. You’ve paid for a type rating, but the airline is paying you to fly.
Paying for a type rating, line training, and 1500 hours (or whatever it is), with no job offer at the end is definitely P2F. You’re not “making your own MPL”. You’re paying for the privilege of sitting in the right hand seat, when the airline should be paying you. You’re practically free of charge, easy, and willing. When you’ve got the hours you paid for, they’ll get rid of you and bring in the next customer. It’s a horribly abusive system.
It’s not an extension of your training either, as you put it. You’re flying a commercial aircraft, at a profit to your master. You’re not in training, you’re working. You’re paying to work. As soon as you sit in the RHS on your first day of line training, you’re working. They pay you to do that. Like it’s been said, you have the licence. Respect it.
It sounds to me like you’re trying to justify your decision to go P2F. I completely understand that options for newly-qualified pilots may be a bit dry as of late. Especially with Ryanair closing it’s recruitment doors, and the thousand or so experienced Thomas Cook, XL, Aigle Azur, and Adria pilots now on the market. Please keep your head held high, see the reality, and stop telling yourself what you want to hear.