I was booked DL HNL-LAX, AS LAX-PDX last night. At check in availability was P4F4 Y7... etc. We retained our coach seats at check in - weren't upgraded on the AS portion. When the flight went out, there were still several empty seats in F, while we sat in back.

We are both NW Gold, traveling on our own individual PNRs.

AS had our frequent flyer information, including the fact that we were NW Gold.

We didn't pursue the issue at either the ticketing counter or the gate, since we had a third, non-elite pax (on her own itinerary) traveling with us and the plane was pretty empty, so upgrading didn't seem to be particularly useful. Probably if I had brought up the issue at the front, we would have been upgraded.

But shouldn't we have been auto-upgraded according to the new policy? NW Golds and Plats are supposed to be auto-upgraded on AS at the 24 hour mark, if there is availability? Or did I not do something correctly?