Schwab is huge, so I'm skeptical that your good experience with them supports the thesis that you stated.
It's a brokerage firm with some banking features. Brokerage firms understand that investors have options on where to take their money, whereas banks like Wells Fargo often seem to forget that.
So it's not that financial institutions can't be good at this, it's that the big banks fundamentally don't care about customers who aren't wealthy or institutional in nature.
But there are definitely alternatives like credit unions, online banks, and brokerage firms with banking services. Not that everyone of these is good, but you have options, especially if you live in a city, like most people on HN probably do.
Quit big banks. Join a credit union, tell your friends about it. Encourage your employer to switch banks too, if you are in a position to do so.