Hello Noel,
I have been down the recycled 120 backing paper road too, but found that the edges of the paper became fraid after three or so cycles of reuse; also the adhesive tape affixing "top" and "tail" to the film emulsion tends to wear the paper thin over the area of contact as each cycle removes a finite layer of paper during the "peeling off" process - but it works as you correctly describe; the 120 backing paper from Ilford is a more elegant albeit expensive option; when I know that I will be developing my 220 film soon after exposure, I sometimes dispense with the "tails" and load the film directly from the camera magazine into the tank (in darkness of course); the elimination of the paper "tails" effectively halves the paper costs; the elimination of the paper "tops" is also possible if you want to load your magazines in darkness but does waste a length of emulsion over the length of the missing paper "top" - and you might end up with a film length that is too long for your developing tank spiral. However each to his own tailor made method.
I have never had a problem with 120 film being scratched by the pressure plate; on well maintained Hasselblad magazines, the film emulsion is always in very light contact with the pressure plate except at the upper and lower extremities of the frame where it is lightly pressed between pressure plate and rollers and during the actual transport cycle when the rollers on the emulsion side should rotate making scratching very unlikely.
Best wishes,
Richard Hughes.