As others said, it depends on the company. It also depends on the country, what you can ask and get varies wildly depending on the place. I always found refer

As others said, it depends on the company. It also depends on the country, what you can ask and get varies wildly depending on the place. I always found refernces to be ridiculous. I never ptovide any and one company that asked got on touch with my good friends (ex-coworkers or not) whi explained that I was the nest Jesus, with an incredible background in technology and management skills that would make Trump pale in comparison. They wanted to talk with my prevous boss but, what a shame, it is illegal here. They would have had good feedback as well, though not new religion grade as the ones they got (and they told me that they were great). I did less great on IQ tests where I ranked between a chair and a fly but apparently this did not matter after all.