Well, if at a dealer next to another car (same exact engine, same year) a tech could remove both engines cam covers, set both to TDC and compare the sprocket marks but to be certain on exact cam timing at TDC, one needs to remove rear cam covers and use the cam position tools to lock them into place and that wouldn't be an easy, simple proceedure.
IMHO, I highly doubt that your cam timing is off (I tend to doubt Daves story, my opinion) as I've never seen or heard of that in any FWD Volvo engine since introduced in '92 here (US). In your case, I'd guess that you might have another issue, could even be software depending on year, model as that too has had a few known performance related problems, solutions.
Have you had a dealer tech look at it for your concern? Have you driven another car just like yours (exactly), same year, etc to compare it to see if maybe it's the same, thus "normal"?