The US tends not to regulate what kind of services a bank has to offer to its customers. A bank doesn't need to offer any kind of transfer services to be a bank. As far as I know you can legally be a bank and only offer cash deposit and withdrawal.

The EU has PSD (Payment Services Directive) and PSD2 which stipulate what kind of transfers have to be possible to customers.

Because of that the US just has a bunch of startups which offer services that unify the payment landscape. The alternatives at a bunch of banks is still that you need to write checks.