Most seat reservations stick...
I rarely get switched on seats (even more so now that the planes are fuller and upgrades down a bit - but I digress). My guess is >95% of advance seat reservations are honored. Contract of carriage clearly states "CO does not guarantee allocation of any particular seat in the aircraft, including advanced seat requests." Maybe some switching was done to accomodate a family or couple who weren't seated together and your seat was not claimed at that point?