[Wardair]

Hi Martin,
Thanks for the private message.
I am afraid that Volvo have taken little interest in this problem that I know many cars have experienced. It seems that they provide a simple brush off in my case it was 'we do accept this can happen'. They knew that the broken Aux belt can interfere with the Cam-belt and trash the engine but made no modifications to prevent this happening!
I escalated the matter to both Volvo UK and European Executive management level but they didn't show any interest. I was requesting Volvo support repair of my vehicle (given the broken Aux belt had interfered with the cam belt and bent the valves) my request was that Volvo provide the main dealer with replacement parts and I would pay for the repair which I thought was a reasonable request in the circumstances.
This is a well known problem and there have been recalls to change the Aux belt tensioner. The original 'normal' Aux belt life cycle was reduced to 54,000 miles but in my case the 3 belts broke way under that mileage and two Volvo main dealers could find nothing wrong.
I had extensive discussions with the Volvo dealer that the car was recovered to by Volvo Assist and they really expected Volvo to offer a goodwill gesture of some sort given the car had been fully serviced by Volvo main dealers since new and I previously had 3 Volvo's from new!
I am still considering submitting a court claim as it has cost me a lot to get the engine repaired. I am afraid The Motor Ombudsman is a joke as it is funded by the Motor Manufacturers so is only good if you want to go after a garage/dealer and it will not handle a manufacturer recall issue (which I believe this problem is, as Volvo could have modified the cars to prevent the catastrophic failure I experienced).
I will try and email you the responses I got to my 3 official complaints submitted to VCUK and you will see how pathetic these responses were, a very similar experience as complaining to the BBC.
Regards
Martin