I would take the cam cover off a see if all the valve spring are OK. The engine pistons do not interfere with the valves by just braking the belt, but if a valve spring brakes then...big problem.

In a word, shouldn't.
The only exception would be if you or a PO had milled the head & block to the point that an interference fit was created. I condsider this highly unlikely. I have not run the numbers to be sure but it may even be impossible.
Many of the guys over on Turbobricks will mill their blocks to provide a certain amount of the piston to protrude above the deck height and into the combustion chamber in the head (called "squish").

There is NO WAY a stock, US spec engine will interfere.

One thing you can ask the shop that might help you determine his honesty is ... "What cylinder has no compression?" or better yet ... "Are all the cylinders bad?" ... leaving him an opening to hang himself.
Although his answer will not prove his honesty, it could damn him. I would not expect more than 1 or 2 cylinders to be affected ONLY IF the above mentioned milling operation had been performed.

I know this is a reach and agree that the other posts are much more likely scenarios.

I have to agree with all the others on this one, get your car as far away from this guy as you can! Volvo 4's have never been interferance with the exception of the twin cam 16 valves that were produced for a short time in the 80's. Damn good engine but had a fatal flaw in the design of the tensioner. This gets me to my favorite rant re interferance engines. The people that create a such a flawed engine shouldn't be allowed to call themselves engineers! All it takes is an old hot rodder's trick to fly cut the pistons to create clearance, and most hot rodders never went to engineering school to learn this, it's all about common sense.

Nope, it doesn't happen with the 940's B230F/B230FT/B230FD series engines. US only--I have no idea about elsewhere. I'm assuming since you're in FL, it's a US car. You can turn the camshaft or crankshaft on these engines without the timing belt connected, with no ill effects.

I suspect if there is no compression, the key broke off of the crankshaft timing gear or something, causing timing marks to be out of alignment when the crank pulley was put back on. Also the harmonic balancer could be screwed up, causing the timing mark on the crankshaft (and therefore the timing) to be off. In other words, it's probably a reassembly problem, not a valve problem.

Another problem is that some older service literature lists the 4cyl B230F engines as interference engines, which they aren't. So, maybe the shop hasn't even touched the car yet, and is simply assuming that there will be a problem when they reassemble it.

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Chris Herbst
Scottsdale, AZ

1992 940 150k
2005 S80 30k

US specs car? If so it is non-interference so no bent valves.

If your mechanic can't get any compression out of it I would guess he installed the belt with the cam/crank timing misaligned.

Randy