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I recall these services used to be pretty crap, bitcoin added a bit of much needed competition

But you're making an assumption here that both the sender and recipient will be using fiat currency in the end, and that crypto is only being used as means to make the transfer. This is not necessarily true.

IMHO, it's a pretty reasonable assumption, as very few businesses agree to be paid in crypto directly.

BTC is not the only cryptocurrency used there. I've sent LTC and XRP most often, but XMR lately. tx fees need not be large (also Lightning Network exists).