Purchase order definition including break down of areas in the definition. Analyzing the definition of key term often provides more insight about concepts. Purchase order can be defined as: Document used by the purchasing department to place an order with a seller (vendor). Purchase order is the document used to let the vendor know what item and how many items a business would like to order. The purchase order does not have a related journal entry because not inventory has been received and not payment has been made at the time of the purchase order. One we receive the goods we will match what we received to the purchase order and record inventory at this time.