Counterfeit $50 notes being passed at several stores at Lemon Tree Passage, Salamander Bay and the Maitland Show were such excellent forgeries that no one suspected a thing until Terry Lee Johns handed himself in to Nelson Bay police station.

Johns, 41, of Shoal Bay, spent Monday night in Raymond Terrace police station cells after confessing to using the fake $50 notes to buy alcohol, soft drink and T-shirts from three stores at Port Stephens on Sunday, as well as using six of the counterfeit notes at the Maitland Show on Saturday.

Terry Johns pleaded guilty to using counterfeit $50 notes.

And while his honesty and co-operation with police kept him locked up overnight, it could ultimately lead to him avoiding a full-time custodial sentence, solicitor James Janke told Magistrate Caleb Franklin in Raymond Terrace Local Court on Tuesday, despite Johns being both on bail and on a good behaviour bond at the time he committed the frauds.

Mr Janke submitted that Johns could be entitled to an Ellis Discount, a significant sentencing reduction only available when the offender voluntarily discloses a crime to the unknowing authorities.