I have spoken verbally to multiple members of Apple's support teams. Apologies if that was unclear. I didn't record this calls, as they did not permit me to.
I would like to think you're wrong, but if they fix this, you're possibly right. My career is built on Apple technologies. I don't love that I'm captured by a vendor, but I have a lot of knowledge, and building to that level elsewhere is hard.
I just want to keep using my stuff, and getting on with the fun things I get to work on. I don't have a strong attachment to Apple, I have a strong attachment to the familiar productivity I normally have.
I do have backups of most data, including photos, but there are things you can't backup like shared actively edited iWork documents, and things like that. I can rebuild from it, but it's still a shitshow and my very expensive devices are bricked.
As an update, they briefly unblocked our account (after admitting it was a bug/issue on their end), and we transferred our money to OFX. But then they locked the account again, and haven't usefully responded beyond sending us some tips on trying different browsers, or operating systems... (yes, this makes no sense).
They've said they'll provide a final response/compensation offer, but that hasn't come, and they've locked down the account again.
Our main, regular, actual, regulated Australian bank does offer a "Foreign Currency Account" in USD (and many other useful currencies), but cannot link a debit card to it, and it can only wire transfer.
Our regular transaction account with our real bank can receive USD just fine, but it will convert into AUD upon receipt, and spent as AUD with the attached debit card.
It's more effective to be able to spend USD directly, as needed.
Wise's offering (and others like it: OFX, Airwallex, Revolut) offer ACH, FedWire, Wire transfer, and a Debit card.
I can answer in our case: as an Australian business that receives a lot of USD, precious few options for keeping that money in USD _and_ having it accessible via a debit card exist. This is one of them. Typically, we don't let much money sit in the Wise account, because as you rightly say, their terms are onerous as hell.
Feel free to chat to me on Bluesky (https://bsky.app/profile/hey.paris) or Mastodon (https://cloudisland.nz/@parisba) or email if you have ideas. I've received nearly 500 emails!