If true, my guess would be that this is for the return flight only. If the stated goal is to prevent lots of fake bookings that no one is actually going to end up flying (whether or not you believe this actually happens on a scale that matters), by the time someone has flown the outbound, you can be pretty sure they're not screwing with you. For that reason I see no need to have a T-72 restriction on the return. Interesting to see if there are any official updates.