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Lack of a publicly run & managed solution like in other countries. Pix in Brazil for example is created & managed by the Central Bank of Brazil to enable general purpose instant payments between anyone: individuals, businesses, the government, etc. In the US, the federal government won't take such initiative, leaving the private sector to coordinate on their own, which is pretty much like herding cats. Network technology adoption & upgrades are voluntary, heterogenous, & slow. For transfers between banks, we can only assume the lowest common denominator of technology networks with longer settlement times.

For instant digital payment, we end up with a patchwork of privately run services wrapping over these legacy payment systems (ACH, payment card networks) like Zelle, PayPal, Venmo. Zelle (like Pix, which was inspired by Zelle) enables fairly instant transfers between bank accounts, but only between participating banks. Since it's a money transfer & not a credit card payment, it lacks fraud payment protection much like EU counterparts. This surprises scam victims who've come to expect the same protections as credit cards.