Bump. Facing a similar issue. Has anyone been able to work with an url that has a fragment ? Even though the documentation here says that fragments are ok, it does not work when setup app clip experiences in the app store.
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/app_clips/creating_app_clip_codes/encoding_a_url_in_an_app_clip_code
Similar to what matthew161 mentioned, this works well in developer mode.