Originally Posted by hillrider
There's no automated process; AA would not have paid for it (remember that they didn't even upgrade the seat-blocking-next-to-elites process to make it compatible with online check-in?).
AA has some stellar people in its system, and you must have found one of them. The record of who's done the seat swap is retained, so I would send a Kudos email to AA about this experience, asking them to identify and forward the thanks to the person responsible for this rather substantial customer satisfaction event.
Actually it is automatic. When 777s were on DFW-LAX, I got to sit in business class on an economy ticket because I'm Gold, and the flight on that aircraft was sold as two-class instead of three.