Motorists may wait weeks for lower petrol prices as retailers use up old stock

Fuel stations are only obliged to cut prices once they have cleared stock that was supplied to them at the higher excise. Photograph: Bianca de Marchi/AAP

Australian motorists may have to wait weeks for the Morrison government’s halving of the fuel excise to be passed on, with one motoring group warning that retailers could use falling global oil prices as a cover to fatten their profit margins.

From midnight Wednesday, the government cut the fuel excise by 22.1 cents a litre for six months at a net cost to the budget of $3bn.