In South Africa (I moved to New York five years ago), it is common for people to transfer money from their bank account to that of a friend's electronically - either online or on your phone.
I was quite surprised coming to the US that it is not common here as well.
It's the same in Europe. My wife is Spanish and when I learned that you could transfer money to anyone's bank account easily and free, my brain exploded.
It's amazing that the U.S. is (was?) considered the leader of technological innovation, but we're still so backward on something like this. It reeks of corruption and lobbyists.
Actually despite my earlier comment, this practice is also very common in New Zealand, and I too was surprised when I spent a year in Washington, DC. However, the idea of doing it via SMS has never taken off here (as per previous post).
I was quite surprised coming to the US that it is not common here as well.