The last time I did a wire transfer in the US (admittedly a couple years ago now) it was anything but instant. IIRC there was a lot of manual work that had to be done behind the scenes to complete the transaction. And you have to do into a branch to do it as well - no internet banking!
Its all about risk. My accounts are cleared to do small wire transfers instantly. But when I received a wire over $100,000 once, it took about 24 hours to verify before clearing. From what I've heard from bankers I've asked about this, they said that wire transfers are indeed instant, but the banks (on either end or both) may hold the transfer for any reason they want.
Exactly what I meant. I have done many transfers in the US as well. I think the fastest was three days for me. The average more like 4-5 biz days (which ended up being a whole week as the weekend was in between).
I believe you did an ACH transfer instead of an American wire transfer. Wire transfers do not take multiple days in America, but they cost a lot of money ($10-30).
So there are ACH transfers, which are much slower, and there are wire transfers, which are somewhat slower and expensive.