IIRC the problem is that there has to be absolutely no glue present for them to be able to recycle it. Even if they can just pry the batteries out, they need to be free of glue entirely.
And if the batteries has to be glue free, then practically all laptop and cell phone batteries can't be recycled because the plastic battery case is glued together.
It's almost as if the recyclers are too lazy to keep their processes up to date. Nah, couldn't be.