NZ banks also have no depositor protection. No equivalent of the US FDIC. Note below from 'jemmyw depositor protection added the past couple months.
Yeah, if the banks could provide a service similar to Wise I'd happily use a bank.
My bank wanted ~$800/mo in foreign exchange fees for what I'm doing. Wise charges me ~$100/mo. That's, what, 700% more fees? I'm saving $8.5k/yr.
Even if Wise imploded tomorrow and I lost the cash I have in there I'm pretty sure after this long I'm still ahead versus having used my bank all along.
And there are a lot of value-adds on top.
I can get a Visa card that lets me pay directly in the foreign currency instead of paying the exchange fee twice. This was a whole separate expensive/specialty product from my bank.
I can send electronic transfers (through Canada's Interac e-Transfer service) that exceed what a local bank will provide even to my business account and completely avoid the need for additional services/hacks/fees/etc. This is, apparently, "impossible and not supported by Interac" according to multiple banks I've talked to, the business rep, etc.
Long story short... I agree. Wise only exists because banks are kinda terrible at this. If the banks sucked less, few people would bother with the friction of the additional account.