I don’t find unbending the leads to be *that* bad, once I came up with a strategy for it. Here’s what I do:
(1) Remove the solder as with any unbent lead; I use a soldapullt. Do this for the whole board.
(2) Stick the pointy bent end of a little bent dental pick under a bent-over lead, apply a soldering iron to the lead/pad, and pry upward a bit until the lead unsticks from the pad/hole. At this point the lead is detached from the pad but still bent over. Do this for all bent leads. Usually it doesn’t take much pressure to unstick the lead from the pad and this is very easy; sometimes it’s tricky when the pad wants to lift up off the board. Don’t let it.
(3) Use a pair of small snipe-nosed pliers to unbend each bent lead.
(4) Verify that all leads are properly unstuck from the circuit board, and remove any screws holding the circuit board to the plate, etc., then just pick the circuit board up, as it should be completely loose now.
(5) Carefully remove the switches from the plate. If the plate is tight, then for Alps switches try to push the little plastic "wings" in on one side and then on the other while pulling the switch out of the plate, as otherwise they have a tendency to break.
On average, a switch with bent-over leads takes about twice as much effort to remove as one where the leads are straight. This is annoying, but not impossibly bad.