can wordfence block actual customers from viewing or purchasing from my website?

Hi @glooper, thanks for reaching out to us!

Failed login attempts are certainly one reason, but reasons for every block Wordfence gives out are available on your Live Traffic page. Simply expand the entry by clicking it (or the eye icon) and it’ll be given in red text.

Sometimes settings like Wordfence > All Options > Brute Force Protection > Lock out after how many login failures can be relaxed to a higher number if it’s becoming a common problem for your customers. We also recommend sites with a large quantity of users (such as a WooCommerce store) to turn off Immediately lock out invalid usernames in this section. A simple typing error by a customer can cause an immediate block, and therefore more administration for yourself if they contact you for the block to be lifted.

In less common cases, contact forms or online store plugins can have actions blocked by Wordfence as false-positives. Unless you see this kind of block in your Live Traffic, you shouldn’t need to take any action. If you do see that one of your legitimate plugins is causing users to be blocked, read about and activate Learning Mode to teach Wordfence the actions are normal and should be allowed in future: https://www.wordfence.com/help/firewall/learning-mode/

Thanks,
Peter.